America's Unique Deaf Stories; Established 1996; 23rd year

Monthly Archives: May 2016

A comic strip is coming out in Italy, designedby students at the Academy L’arte nel cuore.It features four comic strip characters – deafperson, wheelchair person, Down syndrome personand a person without a disability. The deafcharacter’s name is Milko. See the picture at:

Xfinity, under Comcast, provides cable TV services.One Xfinity feature is a bad joke – it has a voiceactivated command. One can instruct by voicefor the TV to do what you want. It is a jokebecause a hearing person can shout “closedcaptions” on the remote and it will turnon captions. A deaf person can’t – and has tolook for the “closed caption” option eitheron the remote or on the TV set. A bad joke,and a nightmare, it truly is!

— deaf colors in future cars

What is a deaf-friendly future car? The dashboard showsdifferent colors to tell deaf drivers that somethingis wrong with their cars. Hearing drivers can listento vibrations and know what is wrong – while feelingthe vibrations can be tricky for deaf drivers. Theengineers at the AgeLab at the Massachusetts Instituteof Technology are working on these deaf color warningideas.

Leslie Grange was fired from her job asBBC News sign language interpreter afterinterpreting for seven years. Why? Shegot bored with news and made up her ownnews. Deaf people watching the newsprogram complained that what she signedwas not the actual news that was takingplace. Why was she bored? She said shehas personal problems. See the pictureat:

In 2014, during the Zombie Walk event at theComic-Con convention, a deaf driver, trappedby the paraders, tried to get out andhit a hearing woman, standing on the sidewalk.This injured woman has filed a lawsuit againstSan Diego. Her attorney said that the cityis at fault for creating a dangerousenvironment where paraders were allowed toblock the stree traffic. The city saysit is not true. The annual parade wascancelled last year for that reason.

— our Deaf Stamps

For years people thought there were fewdeaf-connected stamps. A recent articleby the Linn’s Stamp News said are muchmore connections than what was realized.Examples were Gallaudet honoring PresidentJames Garfield with a sculpture; horroractor Lon Chaney’s parents were deaf,and many other examples. The bigissue, not addressed in the articleis – where are the stamps of deafleaders that helped the deaf? Wedon’t have any!

BE CAREFUL WHEN YOU TALK ABOUT OTHER DEAF PEOPLE
Many deaf people have so many deaf cousins that
they can’t remember which cousin is with which
mother and father, etc.
A deaf friend was saying bad things about
another deaf person. His friend told him that
this deaf person is his very distant cousin,
but could not remember if it was 4th or 5th or
6th cousin, etc!

The waitstaff at the fancy London steakhouse – Hawksmoorare learning British Sign Language. The managementfelt it was the best way for them to communicate witheach other in a very noisy environment – as well asto communicate with deaf diners. The managment feltthat secret sign language is wrong and that theBritish Sign Language is better. See picture at:

Richard Koenigsberg, who is deaf and teachesSociology and Film at East Brunswick High School(New Jersey) finally won his battle with theschool districut to be provided with CARTservices. He does not use sign language andrequested CART. The district said no. He fileda complaint with the EEOC and won. He has noproblems with one-on-one sessions and withstaff meetings because the past administrationwere helpful. But when the administrationchanged, then he lost all the support he had.

— Nyle’s future plans

What is Nyle’s future plans? Not sure if it isa joke or a fact but there is some talk of himentering the The Bachelor TV series. Whichis better for him – The Bachelor or a bigmovie starring role?

from time to time we see deaf sign-sing performers atathletic events, but after the event, everythingis pretty much forgotten. Not that so with ThePhoenix Deaf Women Organization, consisting ofJessica Mikolay Madsen, Melissa Yingst Huber,Belinda Carroll and Dyan Sue Kovacs. The group’ssign-singing before the start of the Phoenix Mercurywomen’s basketball game went viral. This groupis hoping for an invitation to a repeatperformance. A picture is at:

What was Nyle’s fourth trick in his bag oftricks (no music, blindfold, changed music)?The fourth trick was no trick – just dancingstraightforward, possibly disappointingthe audience that expected a 4th trick!

— a state bill that respects the deaf

Michigan state Rep. Martin Howrylak wassuccessful in passing a bill that disallowssuch words like – deaf and dumb, deaf-mute,hearing-impaired from language in statebook of laws. These words are beingreplaced with – deaf, hard of hearingand deafness. He said he read through thestate book of laws and found six of thesebad words. All it needs right now is forGov. Rick Snyder to sign that bill into law.